This is part 3 of a series on silicosis.
In the early afternoon, two women pulled up in a van between the rows of stone fabrication shops and opened the trunk to reveal coolers filled with tamales. With no masks or PPE, they sold lunch to hungry stone fabricators covered in toxic silica dust. These women will continue, shop to shop, every day, unknowingly exposing themselves to a fatal lung disease.
Silicosis, an irreversible occupational lung disease, is cutting the lives of predominantly young Latino stone fabricators in half, with 46 being the median life expectancy.
As these workers cut, grind and polish engineered stone, made with about four times the amount of silica as natural stone, they inhale tiny particles of dust that scar the lungs. Fabricators contracting the disease struggle to breathe; their only hope is to get a complicated lung transplant.
“Silicosis is not a disease that has any known cure. It’s a progressive disease,” said Dr. Jane Fazio, pulmonary and critical care physician at Olive View UCLA Medical Center in Sylmar, during a Los Angeles City Health Commission meeting last week. “If you contract silicosis, you will progress, and if it’s severe, you will likely pass away from that disease without a lung transplantation, which is not a perfect solution.”
Unfortunately, a lung transplant only extends someone’s life by an average of six years.
According to the California Department of Public Health, there have been 294 confirmed cases of silicosis, 30 lung transplantations and 15 deaths in the state. With at least 20-30% of the workforce estimated to be affected, there could actually be well over 1,200 cases in California.
Over half (57%) of the cases identified were in LA, with the Northeast San Fernando Valley being the epicenter due to the high concentration of shops proliferating in the area.
Contrary to previous beliefs that this only affects fabricators, the women who feed them and others in close proximity may also be at risk.
“We are seeing disease in support workers,” said Fazio, “folks that may not be doing the actual work themselves, but may be folks that work around the office, or that work installing, where they’re not really doing much of the fabrication.”
Eric Reyes-Barriga, 36, worked as a stone fabricator in the Northeast San Fernando Valley for 15 years before being diagnosed with stage two silicosis a couple of years ago. He now works with the Stone Fabricators Network to inform the community about the dangers of silicosis and provide resources to workers.
“It’s not only affecting the people working [with the engineered stone],” said Reyes-Barriga. “Now it’s affecting people around the shops, around the area.”
He noted how the offices attached to some of the fabrication shops, where payroll managers and office staff maintain the business, are also exposed to the dust that enters their workspace from the fabrication areas.
In 2016, the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA) tightened the regulations, decreasing the permissible exposure level of silica dust from 250 micrograms per cubic meter of air to 50 micrograms per cubic meter of air.
“For reference, 50 micrograms per meter cubed is like a sugar packet over a football field,” said Fazio. “So to see the amount of silica dust that is generated in some of these shops … it’s very clear that the over exposures are much, much higher than the permissible exposure level.”
Reyes-Barriga said even a designer he knows, who would visit different shops to see the stones when working on projects, contracted the disease.
“Now she has silicosis, and she never worked [directly] in the industry,” he said.
Though some fabrication shops are in highly industrialized zoning areas, others are near parks, schools and homes. In Pacoima, one shop sits across the street from Maclay Middle School, and in the City of San Fernando, a few shops border Layne Park and the surrounding homes.
When asked by Dr. Howard C. Mandel, LA City Health Commission president, about the dangers to neighboring homes and businesses, Fazio said there simply isn’t any data to provide a definitive answer.
“The particles that are generated through cutting engineered stone are nanoparticles. They’re much, much smaller than particles generated through cutting marble or other natural stones, and so they have the potential to really disperse much more greatly,” said Fazio. “But we don’t really have data in terms of whether they’re being found down the street from fabrication shops or not.”
As more fabrication shops become compliant with the upgraded Cal/OSHA standards of wet cutting, ventilation and cleanup measures, the dangers of dust traveling outside the shops are diminishing.
However, just because there isn’t data on potential neighbors affected by the disease, doesn’t mean there aren’t possible cases outside of stone fabricators. Because silicosis is an occupational disease, those who may have symptoms but do not directly work in professions associated with the disease are not likely to be screened for it.
A regular chest x-ray can often miss silicosis, causing victims to be misdiagnosed with ailments such as diabetes, COVID-19, tuberculosis or COPD. Patients typically require a specialist and a High-Resolution Computed Tomography (HRCT) or a biopsy to receive a proper diagnosis.
Reyes-Barriga’s father-in-law was also diagnosed with stage four silicosis and is on the waitlist for a lung transplant. He was misdiagnosed three times before receiving the proper diagnosis.
Aris Melendez, Reyes-Barriga’s wife, spoke with a curious neighbor of a fabrication shop when they spotted her father carrying an oxygen tank. After Melendez explained that her father had silicosis from working as a stone fabricator, the neighbor recounted their own family’s health complications.
“You know what? My dad died of lung cancer. That’s what we thought it was,” Melendez recalled the neighbor saying during their conversation. “We live behind a shop, and there’s always dust at my mom’s house. All of us have always had complications. And I think, now that you’re telling me more about it [silicosis], we might know the cause.”
Fabricators could also be bringing the toxic dust home with them on their clothes, potentially endangering their families.
Melendez said she used to get mad when her husband would go straight to the restroom to shower and change before greeting her and their daughters after a long day of work, but now she is thankful for the protective measures he took.
“Even though you get your air compressor and start cleaning, you’ll still have the dust on your clothes,” said Reyes-Barriga. Although he used to clean up before doing anything at home, “there’s people that get home, and without knowing the dangers, are sitting on the couches, or going into bed directly, or sitting in the kitchen to eat, and that is spreading it around the house, and that affects the rest of the family.”
Next week: Part 4 – Workers’ compensation is falling short for stone fabricators.